PT 109 WAS GONE BUT JFK & HIS CREW LIVED ON
Solomon Islands (JFK+50) On August 7, 1943, Lt. John F. Kennedy and 11 survivors of the PT 109 were rescued by PT-157*. They were met first by Reginald Evans** an Australian coast watcher who had been alerted by JFK's message carved on a coconut and radioed this message to Lumberi...
"Eleven survivors PT boat on Gross Is X Have sent food and letter advising senior come here without delay X Warn aviation of canoes crossing Ferguson"
Robert J. Donavan writes that Evans dispatched seven scouts by canoe to retrieve the senior member of the 109 crew from Olasana. Lt. Kennedy was hidden in the canoe and covered with dead palm fronds as the natives paddled out into Blackett Strait.
When they reached shore, JFK stuck his head out of the palm fronds and said to Evans "Hello, I'm Kennedy."
*PT-157 was launched on Nov 4, 1942 & assigned to the South Pacific. It was struck from the naval register on Nov 28, 1945.
**Arthur Reginald Evans (1905-1989) was born in Sydney, NSW, Australia & worked as a shipping clerk before joining the Australian Imperial Force. First assigned to the Royal Australian Artillery, in 1942 ARE was recruited for the Coast Watch Organisation. Evans met JFK at the White House on May 1, 1961.
SOURCES
"PT 109: John F. Kennedy in WWII," by Robert J. Donovan, McGraw-Hill Publishers, New York, 1961 and 2001.
"PT 157," NavSource Online, Motor Torpedo Boat Photo Archive, www.navsource.org/
PT 157 and Crew
